May 26th Castrelos to Vinhais

May the 26th
Castrelos to Vinhais

Being early we left without saying goodbye to our new friends and filled our water bottles at the fountain, continued past the dovecotes and the shepherd's shed and headed down hill.




There was a bar near the bottom just over a river bridge but it was closed and looked as if it had been for a long time, so we were glad we hadn't gone on last night. I was not going very well and seemed to have trouble keeping up the pace of Janis. We climbed again on rough tracks and the views were fantastic.


















The next village must have been Soeira but I am not sure the photos are of it but probably are.




















We were following a valley and crossed over a grand old bridge, and wandered along un-surfaced country lanes with my companion out in front most of the time, while I took photos.






























































We joined a road and crossed another bridge and climbed up again and branched off the road to enter the village of Villa Verde with its cobbled stone streets.
The climb had been hard and we stopped and sat on a concrete wall at the side of the little street and here we ate our lunch. Hearing some strange noises we turned to look at the rustic door behind us to see a big black pig watching us eat! Janis gathered up our orange peel and fed it to her! The old sow seemed very pleased to see us and gobbled it down and looked for more. She was out of luck as that was all we had!
Janis was first to pack and shoulder his bag while I took his photo as we climbed the last steps of the slope and walked through the village.












On the other side we went down into a beautiful valley again, later climbing steadily until we came up to Vinhais.

















The first views were of the old citadel with its stone walls and at least one square tower remaining.
















Our road went to the right and into the more modern part. It was not very modern, although there was a decorative waterfall and fountains just here.



We carried on to the top of the hill and asked in the shops if there was an albergue. Nobody seemed to know of one but we were told to continue on a little to where there was a tourist office. We found it, but at this hour it was closed! We asked someone and were pointed to a pension sign and told to ask in the bar for cheap accommodation.







The bar was busy but a lady came out and we followed her next door and she unlocked the hostel. We climbed the very creaky staircase and passed a dining room on the first floor that looked quite nice but whether it was ever used one couldn't tell. On up to next floor and then, we turned left and with some trouble she got the door open and showed us the room. It was rough but we took it, I don’t think it had been dusted for a month though chuckle. Janis wasn’t too happy about that, but it was cheap at 25e for both of us.
We showered and later went shopping. While out we found the old town gateway and looked around the oldest part of town.


I had been very small standing on a small hill jutting out from the main mountain and today there was an attempt going on to restore many of the old buildings, but a great many had passed the no return stage, with roofs that had collapsed and walls down. These old buildings stand for hundreds of years, but leave them without a roof and in ten they can be but a heap of stones! Sure you can build again with the stone but it is never the same.
From the tower garden in front of what seemed to be a tiny school, you could see for miles back the way we had come.















There was a grand cross in a small square too.
















Leaving here we returned to the newer part looking for a restaurant and found there weren't many, but chose one in the same street as our hostel that we could come back to later when they were open. I was feeling sick with griping stomach pains and wind and I went to lie down for a while, arranging to meet Janis in the restaurant at 7pm.
In a chemist on the way to the restaurant I bought some aspirin! Janis was outside the restaurant when I got there and we were the first customers to choose a table. I ordered fish thinking it might be better for me as I still wasn't feeling well. Halfway through the meal I went out again and asked the chemist for something to settle my stomach this time! Chewing a couple of indigestion tablets I returned, but sadly I was still unable to do much credit to that meal. Perhaps I would feel better in the morning. What a waste of wine, chuckle.
We checked the washing, which was just as wet as when we had done it! Even after propping my sticks across the window it had been a job to get enough space to hang it out to dry in the window of our room. There was a steep bank, or one might say cliff, complete with stinging nettles and brambles close to the back of the building so little sun had got in to dry anything while we had been out. We decided we would leave most there till morning, hoping that would also feel better in the morning too!

May 25th Braganca to Castrelos

May the 25th
Braganca to Castrelos

We washed and collected our washing that, much to our surprise was pretty well dry! I was the first going down the flights of stairs to the entrance hall and was pleased to see the big iron gates were now open. We had heard someone unlock them about 7am. It would have been about half past now, I had intended to wait for Janis in this hall but I looked outside to see if I could see a café or a bar of some sort, but couldn't see one! It was just starting to spit with rain and damn cold too. A coffee to start was needed for sure! I went down the last steps to the pavement and walked to the corner and looked down the adjoining street. I never saw any bars so, as Janis would still be able to see me I walked a bit further to the next corner but still couldn't see one. I turned back disappointed and walked into the cold wind with its few but large raindrops. I could see Janis had just arrived at the last steps of our Hotel!!!! He hurried towards me and we met on the first street corner. It was then I noticed a door open and what looked like a bar a couple of shops down this street on the left and we both hurried towards it.
It was a bar and there were a few men already there as we dumped our rucksacks and headed for the counter, where we ordered our coffees! From what I remember we were unable to get anything to eat and we were both hungry. The bar was filling up fast and a man had joined us by the bar and I ordered another coffee with a dash of cognac and joked that we needed it today with this cold weather and as I looked I suddenly realised I new him! I looked hard thinking that was almost impossible! The hospital had been all women! Then it dawned on me, this was the man that had saved our tired legs yesterday and driven us into town.
"Hola amigo, tú eres el hombre que traerlo nos ayer"
I slapped him on the shoulder and insisted he have another cognac on us! Hi face was beaming as he nodded and pushed his empty glass forward to be refilled. While he understood little Spanish he understood that, chuckle, and the rest of the bar were told how he had brought us into town. Everyone smiled and welcomed us and it was a great feeling.
Soon it was time for us to brave the weather and they had to go to work too!
As the bar emptied out I hooked up to my pack and Janis shouldered his and we set off past our 'hotel!' We turned the first corner up the hill and as we climbed I turned and snapped a photo of the old castle and town. I wish now we should have done things a little different and somehow gone and looked around this old town more, because the books say there is much to see here! Maybe we would have realised that, if we had been allowed out last night. But this morning we were both itching to get started and find our way out of town. The cold wind now was joined with some heavy rain as we ran to shelter by some tall buildings and get our waterproofs on!
Now, clad in my cape and my pack now on my back, we waited to see if it would stop. It started to ease and we hurried on hoping it would get better. It did a little, but not much. A drizzly cold rain continued as we walked the wet streets and the main road out of town. As we came down a hill it started in earnest again! The roads were awash as we came into Castro or it might have been Legomar, all I seem to remember is we were following the arrows! We spotted a bar on the other side of the road and headed over to it. We had to climb a few steps and opened the door to find the little bar crowded with people. It was with difficulty that we shed our packs and dripping waterproofs, jammed them in a corner and ordered coffee. With our bags using two chairs at a small table there was no room for us to sit! While we waited for the coffee to be made, someone left and we got another tiny table on the far side of the small room. With men leaning against the bar and the three or four tiny tables full there wasn't room to swing a cat, not that we had a cat chuckle! I spotted a large cake on the counter and asked if we might have a piece. It was good. I commented how nice it was to the charming couple behind the bar, and I was told it was home made. It suddenly stopped raining and the bar emptied very quickly and while we ate our cake and drank the coffee, we chatted to the couple behind the bar and had to tell them what we were doing walking in this atrocious weather. We paid our bill but having learnt we were on Camino the lady promptly cut more cake and wrapped it for us to take on our journey! I thanked them both and we retrieved our packs, I took a bleared snap as I put on our rain gear and opened the door. It might be fair to say that 90% of the time we were in the bar, the rain had stopped as we opened that door it started again!
I remember we were worrying about whether we were on the right track while rain was pouring down our necks while we came along a narrow lane just before a junction with a tarmac road. To our right looked like a posh restaurant and the door was open! We entered the porch and we could see there was no light on inside and we thought we would just shelter from the rain a while! The cleaner came out. She could not understand us but allowed us to use the toilet inside, and she rang the owner. He came and we were allowed in, served coffee and empanada and were left us to admire the very nice restaurant come function room. It stopped raining of course until we left, then it started again!

As I didn't write any notes, I am not sure what village it was where we found another bar! It was closed this time but two wooden benches on the porch gave us shelter and we tried to dry ourselves, our clothes and boots. The sun did come out as soon as we stopped, but there was rain in every cloud that went over and each would drop a little just to show if we came out the porch, we would get soaked again! We almost decided to sleep in here for the night but we knew we had not travelled far and felt we might find something better further on. A young lady came and opened the door but she was not opening the bar today she informed us! So disappointed and finding our boots almost dry we put on dry shirts and socks. I took a photo on Janis in the porch and we left. The quaint little villages generally had square cobble stone streets and this one did I remember, but soon we are walking some high but beautiful country. Did it rain? Yes often and heavy yet the sun was bright in between.




















It had almost stopped again when we came into Portela I think it must have been. Anyway it was a very rural village and we walked along its muddy streets. Some were cobbled but some puddled and potted with a few cow pats and straw. I saw an open door in a building that was set back off the road to the left and I could see people sitting at a small table drinking in the gloom. We could do with a coffee again! I went over and looked into what had not so long ago probably been a stable or cowshed. It was very dark inside, the only light came in the open door that I was now blocking! I could just make out a tiny bar over to the left. I backed out and we left our gear outside this time and put out waterproofs over the bags and went in! An old lady who had been knitting got up and went behind the bar and we asked for coffees. There was no coffee machine as far as I can remember and I think she had to boil a kettle on a gas stove to make it! We sat down on one of the rough benches set round the sides and drank the brew and ate a couple of packet cakes while the two old men continued their game of dominoes. I could not understand a word anyone said, and think we were lucky to have made them understand the word coffee! I don’t think Janis or I had been in a more rustic bar, chuckle, I do wish I had taken a photo but I am sure everyone would have run and hid. To come in you had to step over the high wooden threshold and down a brick step. The floor was of uneven worn red brick. There were big brown wooden beams above and white walls. Behind the bar in the corner was another entrance which probably went into the main dwelling. Before we had finished our coffee a group men and, I think, one woman arrived. One pinned up a paper poster on the door about voting in a forthcoming election and the now crowded room was bedlam as all talked politics! Well I presume it was, chuckle. It had stopped raining so we left them to it, squeezed out and hitched up again.




We climbed up the mountain. It was beautiful but very cold. On reaching the top, where a track crossed ours, we stopped and took photos as the sun had come out.

We rested a while. Janis looked at his feet, they were better than the day before! He powdered them with my antiseptic powder and we drank our water.


A nice park bench would have been great here but the rocks were wet and few so we headed downward now on the rough track.





Further on we came to a fork. The left one was tarmac but we took the cobbled right one into the village of Castrelos. I could see a truck and people buying from it down a street. We hurried up to it and bought some fruit, tomatoes and a few olives. We turned round and started to go back, thinking we needed to take the other tarmac road. As we got to edge of the village again it started to rain hard. On seeing a cobbled road joining the two roads, and most importantly now, a bus stop shelter on the side of the tarmac road by the junction, we ran for it. On arriving we thought this just might be the best place we would find to sleep for the night! After all we were very tired and our books and papers said there were no shelter or shops in this village! The problem was it was cold and damp, yet neither of us wanted to walk another 5 kms and maybe still have no bed!
Janis said he was carrying a small tent and I had a big sheet of plastic! We were deciding on what would be the best way we could use both, while I brushed the floor over with a bunch twigs, and then we sat and ate some fruit while the cloud burst did its best to show us where the tiny roof leaked.
"Do you think it will worry anyone if we sleep here, there won't be room if someone wants to wait for a bus?" Janis asked!
"How often would a bus come up here" I chuckled knowing this village was the last on the end of the only made up road, from here up it was just the track we had just walked over!
The rain eased and a gap in the clouds let a little sunshine through as we sat there. The village was downhill to our left. Our bus stop seat looked up the road that we had just run down, that is the road that joined the two forked roads! On the right hand side of it was a large vegetable garden, some grapevines and a driveway to a cement rendered shed with double steel doors. Behind the shed, a little farmland then the mountain top we had come over. On the village side of the road stood a small cottage with roses and a covered porch. A lady came out and sat on a bench and started crocheting.
" What we want is some wine so we can sleep! " said Janis anticipating a rough cold night.
I screwed up my face and said,
"Ain't no bloody bar here."
"I'll go and ask her" Janis said, already on his feet and heading in the lady's direction.
Janis spoke no Portuguese or Spanish but that wasn't going to stop him!
I sat watching and to my amazement he came back beaming holding a plastic milk bottle of red wine!
"Home made too I think" he laughed
We were sorting out what to use to drink it from when the lady approached us
" Are you going to sleep here tonight" she asked me in Spanish?
"Si, si; no molesta demasiado" I said trying to explain that we didn’t want to offend anyone?
"Espera posible tienes una cosa mejor" she said and hurried back to her house.
She appeared almost immediately with her husband in tow and crossed the road to the shed, opened the double doors and disappeared inside! A tractor engine roared into life. Out came hubby driving the tractor and he parked it alongside the shed! Our kind lady now waved us over. Grabbing our rucksacks we hurried across.
"Would you be ok in here for the night? We use it in the summer when its hot for family and friends" she said pointing to a gas stove and benches around the walls.
"Bueno, bueno, muy, muy buen, perfecto, gracious" I exclaimed, while we both acted like a couple of excited schoolboys given a day off!
The rain had gone and sun was coming in the doorway, a good sign that we had stopped walking! We lifted one of the benches to the front to sit in the weak sunshine where it was a bit warmer and were setting out our dinner on the middle when she returned laden. We helped her put it all down on the bench. A big oval plate held a huge piece of cured pork cut in two, olives, bread and another bottle of wine!
"That’s a better wine" she smiled.
I was not sure about the meat, if it needed cooking, I had no stove now!
A little embarrassed I asked "How do we eat this?"
"Just cut it in thin strips and pick it up and eat." She answered smiling, probably thinking the man's crazy. He doesn't know what cured pork is!
Great, I thought, it must be eaten as is, raw. I hadn't been sure. I got my knife and cut the tender meat into strips.
"Like that ok "?
She nodded as I picked up a slice and tried it! It melted in the mouth, the best pork I have ever tasted! Not salty, just full of flavour!
"Wow!" I made the right noises.
"From our own pig that fed on the holm oaks on the mountain" she said pointing "All the rest is from the garden, we killed the pig, grew the tomatoes, the olives and the grapes for the wine!
I think it was about now another of my little koala abandoned me for a cosy life in the Portuguese mountains! Chuckle.
Just then hubby returned with another bottle of wine, putting it down on the bench.
"This is a better one" he said with a laugh!

"What a banquet" I said as we filled the flask tops with wine and toasted the wonderful couple!
They left us to eat and retired to their porch. While we ate Janis said to me
"We ought to take their photo, do you think they would mind?"
We got up and crossed the road and asked if it would be ok
"Si venga"
She beckoned us to sit and quickly dodged inside the door to look in a mirror and adjusted the new broach. We each sat between them in turn and took our photos. I was pleased and tickled to see how she made sure my koala was in the picture!



The crochet was for the church altar cover she told me as I admired the fine work. She kindly presented me with a shirt to replace one I had torn today too! I was so pleased as I knew it would have been ages before I could possibly buy a new one!
We returned and drank another cup of wine with more olives.













We were tired but we needed to go to the bathroom. There wasn't one and we both felt it wasn't right to make a smell here. We closed the door of our home and strolled through the village seeing some strange round buildings that Janis's book said were dovecotes and passed out on out onto the hillside. Here one watched while the other went. It was not raining and the view was fantastic, prettiest bathroom I had been in this trip!



Then I saw the local shepherd bringing his flock home! OOPS! time to go!




























I joined Janis back up on the road and took photos and did my best to chat to the Shepherd as we walked back to a big shed where he opened the doors and most of the flock went in. Just then a young lad joined us with a large bottle of milk, and he proceeded to feed the lambs on the bottle. Janis was thrilled to be allowed to join in and feed a little lamb too and have one suck his fingers. ( I did the oil Paining of him in may 2011)




















For me it brought back so many memories of pleasant hours spent with Pepe Mendoza my shepherd friend, who loved my children as if they were his own. But that was so long ago, when I lived in Alfaz del Pi, far from here, in Spain!